Manchester's tiniest village once attracted busloads of tourists before being abandoned and lost forever

A delightfully detailed miniature village built in the front garden of Manchester family home has sadly now disappeared forever.

The home-made hamlet was built by council gardener Alan Teague, who sold the house in Levenshulme in 1993 following his retirement and moved to Devon. The tiny garden village included a pub, church, thatched cottages, post office, grocery and bakery with opening doors and lace-edged curtains.

It was built purely for the enjoyment of the neighbourhood and his family and even featured a sign that read: "You may walk around if you wish". Alan began building his budding empire in 1979, helped by his partner and fellow gardener, Nigel Joynson.

Both Alan, a foreman gardener with Manchester corporation at Wythenshawe Park, and Nigel, the curator at the Fletcher Moss Botanical Gardens in Didsbury, spent years making their little empire look realistic. The project was finally completed in 1988 and came with intricate details like tiny glass windows and real electric lights.

The bakers even had miniature cakes in the windows and there were flowerbeds and tiny bicycles. Speaking to the M.E.N. in 1989, Alan said: "We got to a great deal of trouble to get the right materials. I've named one set of houses York Terrace, and the pub is named the Duchess of York after the baby hospital."

Another building had the names Joyce and Sylvia on the front. Alan has said in interviews that they were the names of his mother and his partner Nigel's mother.

The M.E.N. caught up again with Alan and Nigel again in 1992, a year before Alan took retirement and sold the house. By this time, word of the tiny village had spread and become something of a tourist attraction.

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